


Witching Hours

by longwhitecoats



Series: Shakespeare in Westeros [2]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Macbeth - Shakespeare
Genre: Gen, Prequel, References to Shakespeare, The King in The North
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-13
Updated: 2017-11-13
Packaged: 2019-02-01 19:55:08
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,650
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12711858
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/longwhitecoats/pseuds/longwhitecoats
Summary: On a rainy night, Stannis tells Davos a story.For Dr_Whom.





	Witching Hours

Davos rolled over and sighed. No light came through the window. A late summer storm had swept over Dragonstone, and it had been raining since yesterday morning. Usually the rain helped him sleep, but it seemed his old instincts had waked him: it was the smuggler’s hour.

Unwillingly, he opened his eyes and let them adjust to the darkness as well as they could between lightning flashes. The thunder was close. He counted: _one, two—_

Thunder roared, and Davos gave up on sleeping. He found his boots and cloak and went down to the beach.

The little bag around his neck thumped against his chest as he walked. He hummed to himself and pulled his cloak tighter as the pebbles beneath his feet changed to sand. There was no real reason to check the boats, of course; he’d checked them before he went to bed; but perhaps running his hands over the lines and knots would soothe whatever old anxieties had wakened him.

Only a handful of boats were docked at Dragonstone’s beach now, and only one worth the name of _ship_ : Davos’ own _Black Betha_. The many smaller craft belonging to the castle sheltered beneath it, inside the portcullis. There was little for Davos to do here on the beach, even with the rain drawing out the length of each task. He stood at _Black Betha_ ’s side, one hand on the line, the cold making his shortened fingers ache.

Then he felt a chill that had nothing to do with the weather.

He turned. There was a figure at the window atop the Stone Drum, watching him. Beckoning to him.

Shivering, Davos went in.

*

“My lord,” he said, hanging his sodden cloak. Lord Stannis sat on one of a few stools scattered before the window, staring into the rain. It felt nearly as cold in this vast room as outside, and the great map of the room’s Painted Table was almost wholly lost in darkness. A few candles were lit in an alcove, to read by, not to be warmed by. Stannis looked up.

“Checking the boats?” he asked. Davos nodded. “We’ve had worse storms.”

Davos hesitated. “I was awake, so I thought I might as well be useful.”

Lord Stannis wasn’t the sort of man who smiled, Davos knew; but he nodded in approval, gesturing for Davos to join him.

He sat. “Is there something you needed, my lord?”

Stannis did not reply. Davos waited, counting the thunder to himself after the lightning flashes. The Stone Drum was aptly named; the whole tower seemed to thrum with the beats of the rain and the growl of the thunder. _One, two, three—_

“My brother is traveling north,” Stannis said at last. “To visit Ned Stark.”

Davos noticed, now, the scroll at his lord’s feet. The writing meant nothing to him; he wondered who had sent it.

“Jon Arryn is dead,” Stannis said, his voice bitter, “and my brother has not so much as written to me.”

He looked sharply at Davos. “It could not be plainer. He intends to ask Stark to be his Hand. _Ned Stark,_ instead of me.” A flash of lightning revealed his expression: he was grim, not angry, Davos thought. Not even especially surprised.

Stannis looked out the window again. “It will be a disaster,” he said softly. The words had the air of a curse.

Davos didn’t know what to say, so he didn’t say anything. The thunder was farther off now, leaving the steady drumbeat of the rain to echo through the chamber. It filled the silence well.

“This is the smuggler’s hour, my lord,” he said. “Perhaps you’d like to sleep. I can keep watch, if you’re waiting for another letter.”

“The smuggler’s hour,” Stannis repeated distantly. Candlelight flickered over the sharp planes of his face. “At Storm’s End, we called it the witching hour.”

Davos nodded. “Aye, my sons call it that too. No idea where they got the name from. Some nonsense they picked up on deck, no doubt.”

Stannis looked at him. “You don’t believe in witches?”

“I don’t,” Davos said. “I believe in what I can see and touch. I believe in the tides and the wind. Never had much use for witches.” All the same, he felt himself touching the bag around his neck, almost for comfort. He pulled his hand away. It was just the atmosphere, he told himself, the candles and the driving thrum of rain around them in the darkness.

“Witches were the first thing I knew about the north,” Stannis said. He set his jaw, and Davos expected him to hold forth on the moral lassitude of those climes, but to Davos’ surprise, he asked a question:

“Shall I tell you the story?”

Breath baited, Davos gave a small nod.

Lightning flashed beyond the window, thunder rumbled, and Stannis began:

“I never had time for nursemaids’ tales. But this was told to me by a man of the north, and one who had no reason to lie. He was a murderer, I think, and he took the black to save his head. He cared little what some lord’s sons thought of him. Robert and I were rapt all the same.

“There have been kings in the north, he said, longer than recorded history. All we have left of them are monuments and rust. But in the early days, they held those wild lands in a bloody grip. And some of them consorted with witches.”

Davos raised his eyebrows at the word _consorted_ , but Stannis took no notice; his expression had become slack and unfocused, his gaze fixed in some other age of the world.

“In the second winter of King DunCerwyn’s reign, the king’s men put down a rebellion on the Stony Shore. As they traveled back through the Wolfswood, a minor lord by the name of MacBeatha lost his way.

“In a clearing, he came upon a strange fog and heard fell voices; and then three witches appeared.

“They were savage creatures, naked, pale, and filthy, streaked with the blood of those they’d eaten. Their eyes were a piercing blue. And they knew MacBeatha’s name.”

Stannis suddenly began to chant; it was so rhythmic that Davos wondered if it was in fact a song, its melody lost or forgotten:

> “Rain and thunder,  
>  fear and wonder,  
>  sing the fortune of MacBeath:  
>  from blood and bone  
>  a crown and throne,  
>  ‘til the forest bring his death.”

As Stannis finished, thunder growled, making the room echo. Davos shivered.

“MacBeatha was so moved by this prophecy that he swore immediately to murder King DunCerwyn and take his crown. Though some say that he hesitated, and was persuaded by one of the witches, whom he took to wife; and they consummated their marriage not with a woman’s blood, but with a king’s.

“Under MacBeatha’s rule, the land sickened. Cattle and smallfolk alike caught chill and died. A creeping blackness rotted the kitchen stores from the Wall to the Neck. And everywhere, the laws of men were in tatters, for MacBeatha secured his rule with death after death, assassinating any lords who dared to challenge him – some with swords, and some by fouler craft. At night, a pale blue fire could be seen leaping in the heights of his castle.

“At last, MacBeatha went too far: he burned part of the Wolfswood to keep his enemies at bay. Or perhaps it was to satisfy some mad desire of his queen’s. They say that she alone killed so many, her hands were stained a permanent red.

“Whatever the cause, the result was the same. The forest rose up and killed him. And that was the end of MacBeatha, and the line passed to their cousins, the MacBolts, whose descendants claim the Dreadfort.”

Stannis lapsed into silence for a moment, and Davos wondered if he should speak. _The forest killed him?_ he thought.

As if sensing his question, Stannis shook his head. “That part of the story was nonsense, of course. Robert loved it. He told the story over and over to anyone who would listen, adding as much fanciful detail as his fevered brain could generate. But in the early histories, I discovered many years later, there is recorded a battle between a King in the North and the Children of the Forest.”

“But the Children of the Forest were dead by then, surely,” Davos said, forgetting himself.

Stannis grimaced. “I said the man who told me this story had no reason to lie. I did not say I had any reason to believe him.”

But Davos felt Stannis’ hesistation. He leaned forward, trying to see his lord’s eyes. “Do you not believe in witches, my lord?”

Stannis studied him. “I do,” he said. “Yes. I believe there is evil in this world. And I have seen things done which could not be done by men alone. So perhaps MacBeatha had his witches. But witches or not, he was a lawless tyrant who cared little for his land, and not fit to rule. That was often the way in the North, before the Seven Kingdoms were united.”

He turned to Davos. “And you, Davos? What do you believe?”

Davos’ heart pounded in his chest. “I believe a man is not a king if he needs a witch to make him one, my lord.”

The darkness made no sound. Davos realized that it had stopped raining. He could see only a sliver of Stannis’ face in the guttering candlelight.

“Good night, Davos,” he said.

Davos let out his breath. “A good night to you,” he returned, and rose.

On the stair, Davos felt his head spin, and he caught himself on the wall. There was only silence above him and below, and he should have been alone; but as he slowly crept down the torchlit tower, it seemed to him that a shadow followed, watching, limned in burning red.


End file.
